Joe Newton dealing with parents

Joe and I have had some (limited) dealings over the course of a few decades, and I've recruited a few of his kids. As near as I know his attendance policy is precisely the same as in that movie (which was, what, 8-10 years ago?), which is the same as it was a few decades earlier: you get a second chance, but not a third.

[If memory serves, some time fairly recently (maybe this century) Joe's #1 xc kid showed up late for practice and was canned, then and there. He was a senior--no chance to come back another year. Done.]

Joe does a great job of communicating to parents and students *exactly* what he expects. His rules are few, and crystal clear. (There are no conflicts with other activities--kids who anticipate such conflicts don't join the team.) And every kid knows that if he messes up, he'll be gone--and another kid (from a squad of around 200!) will be ready to take his place.

What is an "IB kid"?

As a current coach, I have the same problem as well. We have kids that miss a day or even two a week! The excuses seem endless, and I have no idea how to get these kids to come to practice daily. I think alot of it stems back to motivating your kids and getting them to want to be the best they can be. If that is indeed the case, then I've certainly failed at that.

My question is, does anyone know or have any suggestions/advice on how to improve practice attendance? Also, where can we watch the Long Green Line?

The answer is to have try outs and cuts so that you end up with a team of no more than 25. The kids that make the team won't skip practice.

I get the same thing in Texas. The kids think they need to go to every club and do every activity and hold a part time job and so on and so forth.

They are totally under the impression that they should get to participate in everything they want to do without sacrificing anything. So what do we get? Crappy efforts in several extracurricular activities instead of solid efforts in one or two.

I've begun to take my group the way of runner only. They train harder and are less likely to flake on me.

when you have a large team you can have policies like that. when the team is small....your power as a coach goes down. cause if you have a system like that you'll end up with no runners. then the culture is effected and the runners feed off each other. joe newtons philosophy is golden. he supports all the kids regardless of speed. he believes that when you support bottom up - it has the ripple up effect. great coach!

skinbones wrote:

As a current coach, I have the same problem as well. We have kids that miss a day or even two a week! The excuses seem endless, and I have no idea how to get these kids to come to practice daily. I think alot of it stems back to motivating your kids and getting them to want to be the best they can be. If that is indeed the case, then I've certainly failed at that.

My question is, does anyone know or have any suggestions/advice on how to improve practice attendance? Also, where can we watch the Long Green Line?

The Long Green Line is on Amazon streaming and you can buy a DVD. It used to be on Hulu. Joe Newton wrote a book about motivating and training high school distance runners called "Coaching Cross Country Successfully" which is also available on Amazon.

Concerned Citizen wrote:

What is an "IB kid"?

International Baccalaureate. It's kind of like AP I think...basically a college credit high school honors course. I dunno the specifics though, as my HS didn't have the program when I went there.

Maybe i'm being naive, but if kids think they can skip practice multiple times, then you didn't do a good job of communicating what is to be expected from them. This also goes for the parents. The older kids should also be communicating what is expected with the younger runners. I fail to see a problem. If kids skip too many times then they can do something else. If parents complain then they complain. There has to be some standards on a team so the kids who want to take it seriously don't have negative factors around them.

Runner85 wrote:

Maybe i'm being naive, but if kids think they can skip practice multiple times, then you didn't do a good job of communicating what is to be expected from them. This also goes for the parents. The older kids should also be communicating what is expected with the younger runners. I fail to see a problem. If kids skip too many times then they can do something else. If parents complain then they complain. There has to be some standards on a team so the kids who want to take it seriously don't have negative factors around them.

You're being naive. How freaking and frustratingly typical that the coach gets the blame.

OK, I'm sorry if I was mean. I'm calm now.

I coach, it's not as bad as you say but I have found this. I have AP students who never missed a practice and others who miss because of their AP classes.

It's the parents who enable their kids take the easy way out.

My AD backs me 100% and I let the parents and athletes know that if they skip practice for any reason then I'll put as much effort into coaching them as they do into the team.

I'll concentrate my efforts on the kids who want to be there.

I record every workout for every kid (50+ on the team).

When "those types" complain I take out the book and show them all the practices they've skipped or run easy or cut short and tell them they get out of it what they put into it.

They get the meaningless letter and move on.

I would echo your sentiment, but there is a happt medium. I once got chewed out by a coach for missing practice due to a digestive problem. I even had a doctor's note to prove it. I let him know the day of too.

Runner85 wrote:

Maybe i'm being naive, but if kids think they can skip practice multiple times, then you didn't do a good job of communicating what is to be expected from them. This also goes for the parents. The older kids should also be communicating what is expected with the younger runners. I fail to see a problem. If kids skip too many times then they can do something else. If parents complain then they complain. There has to be some standards on a team so the kids who want to take it seriously don't have negative factors around them.

You are 100% incorrect that I am not communicating. I have a contract, parent meeting(s), team website with everything on there, Facebook Page and still get asked the same damn questions every day...every week, etc. I keep attendance and let people know on Mondays by passing out a slip of paper if they missed any days the week before or if they were late and how many unexcused absences/tardies they have for the year. I allow 3. I clearly stated, the administration does not support it. The IB program is AP + more where they have to have more community service hours than the rest of the school, there are more rigorous requirements, some humanities components, and the big one is participation in a varsity sport. Therefore, XC is the dumping ground. Although I'm not sure of this, but I've heard that the more students that graduate through this IB program, more funding can be gained and it also can help the school's state academic ranking. Again..I'm not sure of that. So although I do have heavy support from the AD....my policy does not mean anything. Having cuts in a viable option, but the head of the IB program at the school. Perhaps I'll post the emails he has sent me in the past. He truly thinks the rules don't apply to him and I'm ruining these kids lives. But that's my battle. I was just wondering how Coach Newton handled his attendance problems, because in that movie with all of the trials and tribulations they went through that season....not one parent complaint. It almost seemed fake to me, but it perhaps it's not. If there's one things I learned, ditch the computer so I don't get so many D Bag parents' emails.

Ellery Queen wrote:

[quote]dustdevil wrote:

I would echo your sentiment, but there is a happt medium. I once got chewed out by a coach for missing practice due to a digestive problem. I even had a doctor's note to prove it. I let him know the day of too.

I don't chew anybody out and am reasonable, but being there is a choice. For unquestionable legal reasons, I do not argue with a doctor's note. That is an excused absence, because the athlete does not have a choice to participate that day in a workout or meet that day.

It looks like you are in an unfortunate situation. Some people either don't know or care that without standards the overall team is going to suffer. I guess with Newton, he was there so long ago before these problems existed and developed a solid program and the community is very much behind him. Best of luck.

I think your best bet would be to talk to former Yorkies about how he implements everything. I'm friends with a few and they all back up what's said in the movie: If you miss a second practice, you're gone. Here's a message he sent back to me after I asked him for advice. The guy in question was York's #1 for a couple years.

Newton was a great coach and a good thing about his methods is that they are very reproducible. I'll take you through a sample day of practice.

The first thing that you do when you get to practice is have a sign in sheet. If anyone at your school wants to be a manager this is a great spot for them. The athlete "checks in" by saying his last name or when Newton knows them he'll say something like "Achtung, checking in". When you give a nick name to someone it makes them feel special and appreciated. It can be something clever about their last name (achtung), where they're from (philly), or just something about them that stands out (shades). He had very strict rules on tardies and missed practices, but those would probably be best reinforced after you win a few state titles haha.

After this there would be a very long meeting where he goes through the workout, what the kids did last year in the workout, stories from last years workout, etc. Goes over where practice is on Saturday and what time. Then the thought of the day: This is something that you can relate to running but also to life. So he'll ask the crowd "Now what in the hell does that mean??" and explain it in terms of life. These are quotes easily found online from coaches or make up your own. He does this every day. He'll spend sometime breaking the balls of some of the athletes to show them how he can have fun. The way he interacts with athletes is tough to reproduce, though. For me, he knew he could constantly break me down and tell me how poorly I was doing because he knew it would motivate me. With kids with other personalities, he would ONLY give them positive reinforcement. He would do this by accessing their personalities. I've talked with him about it and he's told me he has a different way of interacting with all of his athletes.

The love part. He was like a second dad to me. One thing he stresses in the first meeting: I trust all of you, and you should trust me to make you a better runner and person. but break that trust and it takes months to rebuild. He expects people to work hard and they will see results. Just by saying things like that and showing that you care, you will get their respect. He doesn't treat anyone differently. If I was tardy two times in a season, he would have benched me just as he would someone running a 10 minute mile. Just show the kids that you REALLY care that they're getting better, not necessarily winning.

Freshman mileage- if the kid has never ran before, he'll have them run one to four laps around the track and then send them home. He'll give them abbreviated workouts and treat them like celebrities. Start them off running 15-20 miles per week and increase by 10% per week to prevent injury.

Recruiting. Have your "heavy hitters" (kids that are not completely socially awkward) hit the halls and try to sign kids up not doing a fall sport to cross country. This is how some of the best runners newton's ever had have started. The more kids you have on the team, the better.

I coached xc this past year and like someone earlier said, because it was our first year as a program, I only had about 15-20 kids between both guys and girls. If I kicked people off after one absence, there just wouldn't be a team.

I have had the same issues in the past and this I had the kids sign a contract. We start practice 30 mins after school anything that needs to be done must at this time. They are allowed to be 20 mins late, but must talk to me first. I give 2 unexcused absences before you are off the team. Not going to lie I had to get rid of about 8 kids, but once I did the team has really come around.

As a coach, the staff and I also make our kids sign a contract that outlines everything as well. Communication isn't always the problem, although I can see why that would be the case in some programs. We also have a Facebook page, a parent meeting, and even send out weekly email updates that spells everything out for all parties involved. It is really frustrating having athletes missing so many practices, we can all relate to that for sure.

With all that said, I still think alot of it comes down to motivating your athletes to want to be the best they can be. That is much easier said than done obviously, and it's a big key to coaching any sport, especially running. As a coach, if you can get everyone to buy in collectively to accomplish the same goal, and have your team leaders begin to hold everyone accountable in addition to you as a coach, then you know you have it made.

As a few posters noted above, it is much easier to implement stricter attendance policies (and all other policies for that matter) once you've established a large program population wise. As a coach, you have more power then, and can afford to have some attrition. It's also easier once you established a winning program/tradition. People are attracted to winning teams, and as everyone knows, it's always easier to recruit once you've established a winning culture.

At our school, we are about to begin year 2 of our plan throughout XC season to create a winning program. The key in the first few years to me is simple. The goal is to create a culture that makes everyone feel like they are a part of something special. In the early years of building a program, this to me, is the most important thing to remember.

Bump

You need to act on your 3 absences policy. Start giving kids the boot. Don't sign them up for meets and kick them out of practice. You say you're outta here anyways because you don't even coach anymore? What do you do at practice?

dustdevil wrote:

I'm outta there this year since I really don't coach anymore anyway.